<p>See if he will sleep in a twin bed in the spare bedroom. Get a zippered plastic mattress cover. Use only a fitted bottom sheet, (no mattress pad). Do not let him drink any fluids after 7pm. Have his urine tested to see if he has a UTI. Ask MD about a medication to have him sleep or be lest restless, if this should work, you could then go to the mattress pads that Gtalum suggested, (we use these with both my aunt and mother but they do not remove them from the bed). You could also try putting the pads on the bed, then taking a flat sheet, fold in half and place over the pad and tuck under mattress on eith side, (a drawsheet). If the MD thinks that he can tolerate something like lorazepam at night, he should sleep a little better and perhaps not pull off the sheets. You could also use the depends and place a large nighttime sanitary pad in the front. Sending hugs!</p>
<p>I was just going to suggest the draw sheet idea that ECmother suggests. Most elderly folks cannot untuck the draw sheet from both sides without a major ordeal. Yes, your mom needs to decide on moveing or get help since the problem is going to get worse, not better. It sounds like the siblings is an excuse, not a reason. It is helpful for you and as many siblings as you can have together and insist on another option. That is really the only way we got my in-laws and my parents to realize that the time to move is now. </p>
<p>Dharma, what great progress you are making. The fact that she doesn’t want to use up all her assets is huge! Looks like she is thinking about others. </p>
<p>Hugs to you greenwitch. My dad died from Parkinsons in June 2013. It is a cruel disease. My mom cared for him as best she could,but it got to be too much for her. He needed help with every ADL and he was falling quite frequently. We started with part time help several days a week and within 18 months, we needed round-the-clock care. Thankfully he had long term care which covered about 75% of the care expenses. Our out-of-pocket was still pretty significant. Still, the woman who cared for him the last 9 months was a special angel and none of us would have wanted anything less for dad. </p>
<p>The 3x3 bed pads will be much easier to remove in the am than changing sheets (especially when it’s Mom doing that task.). Some (like those used in hospitals) will have a plastic barrier for the mattress side, are disposable, so no washing. </p>
<p>And, many AL places have guest accommodations. We used to use the room at my grandmother’s place, less expensive than a motel and meals included. My brother chose to stay at a local cheap motel, but have all meals with her.</p>
<p>Just a note about the high cost of workers comp—claims by caregivers due to lifting/transferring etc are very common. As you might imagine given the probable age of the caregivers (even if they have learned proper transfer techniques)… </p>
<p>The workers comp situation in NY state is not very well run and I have heard ridiculous, arbitrary premiums that seemed to make no sense whatsoever.</p>
<p>Greenwich/Mansfield - my mother also died from Parkinson’s. I agree, it’s a mean one. I don’t have much more to offer. In her case my dad was caring for her and it was progressively getting harder and harder but she passed away before he had to get serious about help. She declined very quickly at the end. Had a lot of hallucinations too.</p>
<p>Update, flew cross country to see my mother in her AL. She was transferred there after a ER , hospitalization for a UTI ( minor ), directly to AL in her home town, much against her wishes but did not fight it. Weekly visits from neighbors and sister in laws is nice. Bizarrely she is loving making crafts( who knew) and I hung her wreath outside her door. She has made friends and loves loves the food. She gave me a tour and was proud of the place. Just walking around the place is more exercise than she has gotten for years. She went through the stages of grief I talked about pretty well. It looks like acceptance is just about there in this past one month. I alone visited her home and it was not good. This is dramatically better. She called my B tonight and told him to sell her car , she does not need it.
One month ago she asked to drive. She has mid stage dementia but the routine there is good. Cannot improve on this for now. I came unannounced and observed the LPNs in action. It reminded me of daycare visits 20 years ago. I cannot believe she did not beg me to take her to her home. She said she feels safe there.
3 more days here and a 40 yr high school reunion a first for me coming up… But that would be for another thread…</p>
<p>How wonderful for you and your mother rockymtn high!</p>
<p>LF, your story of your D2 and her friend–what fine, helpful girls–reminds me of how, over the course of years, I and my husband cleaned out his parents’ country house. They were hoarders, the type who never recycle a newspaper but add it to the top of the pile of many piles throughout the house. The stepfather was a tax lawyer but he didn’t even know to have his WIFE’s name on the title/deed of the property so that it would go to her when he died. When FIL was on his deathbed, DH rushed through county court and got it done. Then a moving van took nearly the entire contents of their house and put them in our garage. I was stunned and brokenhearted. Husband said nothing when–and it took years–piece by piece I lugged each item to the dump. With three little ones on the scene, no less. The MIL moved into an apt in NYC and hoarded again. DH went down after work every Fri to shop, clean the mouse poop, do the dishes that piled up, vacuum, and take away the piled up NYTimes. And believe it or not, they also had two houses in the south of France (both parents had grown up rich and spent/overspent frivolously) and my husband escorted my MIL to France–she refused a wheelchair at the airports and walked in baby steps with a cane. This was in nowheresville France. In French, my husband made the arrangements with the realtor to sell the houses and arranged with a carter to take away the entire contents if the houses. The house in the country paid off their huge debts. The sale of the two houses in France (one in “town” and one in “the country”) gave MIL the money to live about five years in the IL home before she had to move to the NH almost at the exact time her money ran out. For years this couple ate lunch in a restaurant every day. My DH never lied to me but once. I found out that years ago when I was out of the room, FIL had asked him to lend him $10,000. DH did. At the time of the sale of the country houses, we found out that FIL had borrowed much more from the three children from his first marriage. DH took care of paying each child back after FILs death. To get my $10,00 back–after repeated requests over the phone to get a check in the mail–I drove all three girls to their apt in the city. He sat on one love seat and I across from him, he got out his checkbook and wrote the check and gave it to me. I felt like I was in a movie about the Mafia. The once-rich tax lawyer spent all his inheritance and money and his widow lives in a NH now on Medicaid.</p>
<p>Old mom, I would never make a remark like that to my mom. For one thing, aside from not being nice, it is too “intimate.” Your remark got me thinking, how would I characterize my conversation with my mother? It is like this: I am the customer service agent at Lands End, polite, profesional, detached and patient. She is a querrelous customer who sighs when they don’t have her size or the color she wants. Etc. </p>
<p>LasMa, when your dad resisted going to AL, how did you actually get him there and get him to stay. Did you and your family have to deal with selling the house and dealing with his goods?</p>
<p>Dharma, it’s not just saying “I told you so.” It’s a lot of “if we had done this sooner” and “as I have been say8ing for months” statements that they really pick up on. Sometimes a day dawns when they think they have a great idea to do x, y, and/or z which you have pushed for for years. And the right answer is, “Oh wow, what a great idea! How smart you are to think of that!”</p>
<p>Wildwood, I read your post–and I am not a crier–and thinking about it while I talked over the day with DH made me cry and cry. I am going on and on in my posts and you are quietly dealing with a 92 year old father who wets through Depends and has dementia, and your mom (and I guess maybe you too) will have to deal with washing cloth diapers. And your posts were so crisp and matter of fact when obviously there is a lot of stress there. Have you and your mom talked about a move to a NH? </p>
<p>Last night I drew up an updated cost analysis comparing caregiver-costs and staying in home and paying those costs vs. selling the house and moving into AL at the Resort. I had spent at least another hr on the phone with two patient people at the Payroll service who explain what each cost represents.Cost comparison: the subject my mother told me never to bring up again. I slept badly and little last night because the “at home” figure is so high. We are BOTH seeing the elder care lawyer on Mon. This morning I am going to call the elder care lawyer’s secretary and ask her to please invite me in to see the lawyer alone for five minutes. I want the lawyer to see the cost analysis; I’ll tell her my mother will not speak to me about it but perhaps, as you (the lawyer) consider this in the light of practicality, you can raise the subject with her and get her to look at this one-page, very clear and alarming document. Then bring in mother. But I expect my mother will flail up and say No. She is attached to her dining room set, her piano, her couch like a maniac. I’m sure she will stay in her home till the last possible minute. But maybe SOMETHING will penetrate if the lawyer shows it to her.</p>
<p>The funds generated by IRA and reverse mortgage were expected at best to last three years, but judging from my updated cost analysis, more likely two. Reading in the NY Times article about how good nursing homes have waiting lists, I called the one my mother liked and learned they DO take Medicaid and they DON’T have a waiting list. She KNOWS she is going there when her money runs out.</p>
<p>Haven’t heard from my sister, but this morning I am mailing her a copy of the new cost analysis and stating clearly in a letter (friendly and nonjudgmental) that there will be no inheritance…except I suppose the cash from selling/auctioning furniture.</p>
<p>You’re right, old mom. Good luck tomorrow - hope the day goes fine for all!</p>
<p>Rockymtnhigh – I’m so glad it is working for your mom. </p>
<p>Post-stroke, my mom periodically attended an adult daycare center. While getting her ready to go was a chore, she really enjoyed being there, even though she was never, ever a joiner of anything in pre-stroke days. The staff was wonderful and accepting, and we have a very funny photo of mom in rapt attention while an Elvis impersonator entertained them. They were one of the organizations we donated to after she died. (Which reminds me that I should add them to this year’s list as well since we’re ramping up charitable donations now that D is done on the college front.)</p>
<p>Dharma, the way we got him to AL was that we didn’t give him a choice about it. Over a period of time, my brothers and I saw what was happening, that it was becoming dangerous for him to live there, and we decided among ourselves that it was time to make a move (a step you get to skip; sometimes it’s challenging to get all of the siblings on board). We didn’t present it to him as a question or something to be negotiated, but rather as something that had already been decided. We gave him our reasons, and he protested all of them. Our response was, “We’re sorry, Dad, but you’ve been to the hospital x times in the last year for falls and overdoses, and it’s just not safe for you here any more. We love you and we want you to be around for a long time, and that’s not going to happen here.” We were as kind as we could possibly be and we’re lucky that he’s not the vicious sort like your mom. But bottom line, there was nothing he could have said that would have made us waver. It was happening, with or without his approval. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done – AND it was absolutely the right thing, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat.</p>
<p>I think it helped that we had done a lot of research before we dropped the bomb, so that we could offer what seemed to us like a good alternative (although it didn’t seem that way to him!) We were able to answer all his questions about transportation, cost, care, meals, etc etc. Not that that made him happy, but at least he knew we had done some thinking about this.</p>
<p>As to what happened after, as I said he was very unhappy there for several weeks, talking about “making a run for it” etc. I didn’t try too hard to talk him out of it because I was assuming it would be temporary (although I did tell the staff so they could keep an eye on him, as well as give him some extra attention and TLC). I spent quite a bit of time over there at first, eating meals with them in the dining room, dragging him to card games, hanging out in the apartment. Then once when I was taking him to an appointment about a month after they moved in, I asked how he was feeling now. He said, “It’s not that there’s anything bad. It’s just not home.” I didn’t try to talk him out of that either, just said I could understand that, and it was a big change. Then one day about 3 months in, Mom said he was sitting in his chair, and looked around and said with a smile, “This is home.” And 3 months after that, he didn’t even remember the old place!</p>
<p>We did have to deal with selling the house and disposing of possessions, and we found a fantastic solution for that. See post #3091 in this thread.</p>
<p>Oh interesting. I said “he’s not” instead of “he wasn’t.” I miss my daddy. :(</p>
<p>I miss mine too, LasMa. :(</p>
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<p>Dharma, you are somehow expecting your mom to be practical and reasonable. There is nothing your have told us about your mom to suggest she has ever been practical and reasonable, and there really isn’t any reason for her to start now. You are there to make sure her demands, whether reasonable or not, are met. Until you decide you won’t, your mother will continue to do what suits her. </p>
<p>My parents toured the tiered living IL/AL/NH place this week. Filled out the paperwork and sent in their application. Thank you, God. May they just stay healthy enough to get through the waiting list, which is about 3 years. This is a lovely place where about 10% of the current residents are coincidentally members of their small local church (it’s a non-profit associated with another denomination but no religious requirement). Plus there’s a dock so by brother can come by and pick them up for a boat ride.
Which reminds me that I recently talked to a HS friend about her mother, who had moved to a retirement place for folks associated with the university (Dad had taught there). Mom had signed up knowing several people in the building. By the time she moved in they had moved on. Friend was worried, these were life-long ties. Nope, mom made great friends with the people who were there. Other widows of professors, women who were into reading and the arts, yoga buddies.
Gives me hope for the future.</p>
<p>Update on AL . Visited mom again today , complete frustration on the phone front, she never was good with devices but a simple ‘close the phone when you are done’ was a struggle. Otherwise distraction worked really well. We went on an enclosed garden area and sat. My elderly Aunt told be about a brutal stabbing of her childhood friend in her own home at 11PM while her husband is in a NH, assailant got $5. This was the really nice area of town. Thinking AL is a good place for mom, she was living by herself in an OK area before.
Like LasMa she really was not given a choice. I can only hope for the same adjustment and same time frame.</p>